iPad mini review
Small is now beautiful to Apple - but is it too stripped down?
Apple has gone where we never thought it would, with the iPad mini bringing the Apple tablet experience to a brave new budget world.
The new tablet comes in at a wallet-friendly £279 for the basic version, with 16GB of storage on offer for the Wi-Fi version. You can supplement the mini-slate with up to 64GB of space to chuck movies and music, as well as 4G LTE connectivity, but that will set you back an eye-watering £529 for the top model.
But then again, the iPad mini release isn't about the top end specs with a whopping price tag – it's about beating the likes of the Google Nexus 7and Amazon Kindle Fire HD in the budget stakes.
The two competitors have been getting many column inches so far thanks to the super cheap prices and the impressive specs on board – although with both only offering a 7-inch screen compared to Apple's 7.9-inch offering, the Cupertino board is confident its device will win the day when it comes to capturing consumers' hearts.
However, the more frugal shopper, and especially one buying for a loved one, may not agree with this idea, as the Nexus 7 or Kindle Fire HD costs around 40% less and when faced with a choice between the three might opt for the familiar Amazon brand or the sheer power of the Nexus 7, with its mightily impressive spec list and legions of Google apps.
That said, Apple fans need not worry too much when it comes to whether the iPad mini is a worthy addition to the iBrand, as it comes with enough power and reams of Ive-inspired design to make it a worthwhile addition to the range – this isn't a shrunken down iPad, it's a whole new product again.
Be it the larger screen size, the impressively low weight or the alternative design compared to the competition there's a lot to chew over with the iPad mini – but is it worth spending your hard-earned when more cash will get you a fully-fledged version of Apple's tablet?
The iPad mini is one of those devices that exists because the market started to dictate its presence…but that doesn't mean Apple doesn't want to put its own spin on things.
To that end, the screen is larger at 7.9 inches, the design is completely different to the likes of the new iPad or the Google Nexus 7, and the whole ethos has been created from the ground up partly under the stewardship of Sir Jony Ive, according to Apple.
None of that matters though – what is important is the fact it's a superbly-designed device that at least gives a measure of why it costs so much more than the likes of the Kindle Fire HD.
The aluminium chassis shares the same colouring as the iPhone 5, with the darker black slate and white silver options both bringing a touch of class to proceedings.
At 308g it's twice the weight and then some of the iPhone 5, but compared to other tablets on the market (and combined with the aluminium chassis) it gives a very lightweight feeling the hand.
The screen is something of a worry though – with the 1024 x 768 resolution in the expansive display we're only getting a sharpness akin to the iPhone 3GS. While the display is better than that, thanks to improved IPS LCD technology, its still light years behind the Retina display on the bigger brother new iPad.
If you own a modern iPad, you'll notice the difference straight away. But then again, if you have one of these, then you won't want to buy the iPad mini.
Where the tablet will struggle to impress is when users who own an iPhone are checking it out, as it certainly doesn't have the wow factor of other devices.
In a side by side test of the same movie running on the iPad mini, theNexus 7 and the Kindle Fire HD, the iPad looked the least impressive (although the contrast ratio was certainly more than decent in our eyes).
Then there's the issue of holding the actual tablet. As Apple says, it's as light as pad of legal paper, and there's definitely no notion of this causing undue wrist strain. However, there is an issue with actually holding it, as the iPad mini doesn't really lend itself that well to any manner of grip.
The handsets have been getting criticism for exposing the silver metal below with minimal scratching, and this has begun to happen within a day on the iPad mini – which is all the more confusing seeing as it doesn't live in the pocket with keys and coins.
It's something we hope Apple would have changed in the manufacturing process already, and means you'll need to keep a real eye on how you look after the tablet.
The top and the bottom of the bezel are also wide enough here to rest your hands comfortably, and the likes of landscape web browsing and accelerometer-based gaming are excellent.
The rest of the design is predictably ergonomic when it comes to tapping the minimal level of buttons. The volume rocker keys are close to, but not too near, the mute switch on the top right-hand side.
This is near the power button, which is intuitively placed to always be easy to hit when you want to reactivate the iPad mini… although many will just hit the home button to achieve the same thing.
That traditional Apple home key is predictably here again, and it's shrunken somewhat to fit into the smaller chassis. However, during our testing we found it just as easy as ever to hit, despite the dinkier dimensions.
It's interesting that Apple has popped the headphone jack at the top of the iPad mini, given it's put so much effort in chucking it down at the bottom of the iPhone 5... but we do love it staying above the screen.
The speakers are at the bottom of the iPad mini, flanking the Lightning connector, which offers faster speeds of data transfer and can be connected either way round that you fancy, which is handy when charging before bed and can't be bothered to put the light on.
The speakers provide decent enough sound, but in landscape mode really create a distorted sense of audio, thanks to it firing quite mono-directionally.
The processor being last generation, in the shape of the Apple A5 effort, may worry some but it's likely to be enough for most actions, coupled with 512MB of RAM. It's miles away from the raw grunt of the Google Nexus 7 or the new iPad with its A6X processor, but Apple reckons it helps it hit a sweet spot in terms of price.
When it comes to the interface on the iPad mini, it's not going to be a shock to any long-time Apple users, with the same iOS 6 method of displaying icons still as prevalent as ever.
This means the transition to the smaller size of device will be easy for most, as although the iPad layout, with more space between the icons on the home screen, is prevalent once more, it shrinks down nicely.
Holding the iPad mini in portrait mode is easy enough thanks to the weight, and prodding the icons on screen isn't too difficult nor does it feel like you're going to push the tablet out of your hands and onto the floor, waiting for that heart-stopping moment when you see a crack slide across the display like demon fingers reaching into your wallet.
The iOS interface is simplicity itself, so any users not familiar with Apple's mobile operating system will pick it up in no time at all. The icons are laid out in a 4 by 3 grid, and unlike on the iPhone they will rotate when you move the tablet into landscape format.
The ability to place icons in the bottom dock means you can have the apps you want pervading around the home screen, while dragging and dropping said apps on top of one another will allow you to create folders with ease, which you can rename anything you want.
As we expected with a device running iOS 6 there are no widgets to speak of, which means the only app you can really control from the home screen is the music player, which can be accessed by double tapping the home button (which activates the list of recently-used apps) and swiping left for access to the music controls.
What is also nice here is you can alter the brightness of the iPad mini from the same screen, as well as change the speaker output if you're using AirPlay... little things but the direction Apple needs to take to make iOS a little more modern. It's nothing new, but it works very well on the smaller tablet.
The lock screen is a slightly different matter; for those au fait with iOS on the iPad, this will be old news, but for the newcomers: if you double tap the home button here you'll be presented with access to your music controls again, along with album art displaying when you're listening to music.And there's also the option to have the lock screen as a slide show of all your favourite pictures, which is started up by pressing the photo icon at the bottom - it's these little tweaks that have brought joy to so many Apple users over the years, and we're still impressed by them today.
However, this is still iOS 6 running, and that's becoming something of a problem in our eyes. Not so much at the moment, as there's enough simplicity and function on offer to not make us too worried, but it's a system that is starting to show its age.
For instance, one of our main bugbears is through controlling settings - this is still only really possible through the main 'Settings' app, which means if you want to tweak mail settings, music or apps themselves you'll need to jump out of whatever you're doing and head into another menu from the home screen just to make a small alteration.
However, Apple is still catering for the iPad owners with some handy gestures to make things easier to move around. Instead of double tapping the home button to switch apps, touching the screen with all five fingers and swiping left and right will move you through the most recently-used apps, and pinching all digits together will return you to the home screen.
This is really helpful when using the tablet on the move, as it means you don't need to shuffle the palm around to hit the home button - and it's really cool too. It's an even more intuitive system on the iPad mini than the iPad 'proper', as it somehow fits the screen size better.
We still like the Facebook and Twitter integration – being able to post thoughts directly from the notification centre (available anywhere by dragging from the top of the screen)
Apple might be criticised for bringing last year's technology to the iPad mini, as the A5 chip with 512MB of RAM doesn't sound like a lot when you can buy the quad core Google Nexus 4smartphone with 2GB of RAM for the same price as the mini, and with the same amount of storage too.
However, in practice it's really rather hard to fault Apple's interface performance when using the device in day to day use. It's definitely not got the grunt of the larger new iPad 4, as when we were setting up the device and downloading all manner of music and settings the whole thing melted down and wouldn't let us move around menus or see what was going on with other apps.
But that was a rare situation, as only apps getting snarled up and shutting themselves down caused us any consternation in day to day use. This isn't a regular occurrence, and to be fair happens a lot less on iOS than it does on Android, as Apple's quality control is a tad higher when allowing apps into its marketplace.
And let's not forget about real world use - we tested this side by side with a number of other tablets, including the quad core competition, and when it came to browsing speed we were impressed to see the iPad mini coming up trumps in the speed stakes on a number of occasions. Benchmarks confirm that it can ripple along as well as the competition, and validates Apple's decision to stick with the older processor to keep 'costs down' (or margins up)...
The only real gripe, and it's one you'll hear time and again from us throughout this iPad mini review, is the fact that the screen is too low-res. It simply saddens us to see menus we're used to on both iPads and iPhones not having the same sharpness as before... and we're certainly not used to seeing Apple take a step back in quality.
If you've never used a top end smartphone or tablet, this won't be an issue as the display is fine, and technically still HD in terms of pixel count. But it's definitely the trick Apple is holding up its sleeve for the iPad mini 2 - that Tim Cook is a sneaky one, isn't he?
The way the iPad mini handles messages is two fold: through the impressive email client and now with iMessage on board. When it comes to emailing, there aren't many better clients on the market, with an expansive view and the ability to see your messages differently in both portrait and landscape mode.
You can have multiple accounts set up on the device, be it through Exchange or a web-based service like GMail, and then you're able to see these individually or together in a unified inbox. Either offers an excellent view of your message, with it being easy to delete emails as a batch or as single missives.
But it's the little tweaks that make this option a decent choice for a work-based tablet, if you're one of those types that move around a lot when doing business things.
It's not going to change the world, but there's a lot we like here: the power draw of the email client is relatively minimal compared to older Apple products, you can easily manage folders and see specific emails through the search function and it just makes everything easier than competing products on Android.
And little touches, like being able to swipe right and pull out the inbbox make it a real winner in terms of usability.
The keyboard on the iPad mini was an area we were interested to drill into, as given the smaller proportions of the device we wondered if it was going to be any easier to type on than the larger iPad.
Well, in normal portrait and landscape modes it's a little bit odd. With its bigger brother (and most large screen tablets) you can place them on your lap in landscape mode and rattle out messages at a fairly rapid rate thanks to the bigger display.
That's not possible on the iPad mini really, and holding the device in portrait means you can't type one handed either. However, if you use Apple's clever split dock keyboard, the whole system is much better. This feature is available on the bigger 'Pad, but with the larger size the weight made it hard to hold and type with.
For the iPad mini, typing on the move is an excellent experience once you spend some time practicing - entering text on tablets has always been hard, but this is as easy to use as the impressive SwiftKey on Android, bar the clever auto-prediction of text.
It's obvious Apple would include iMessage on this device, allowing you to send messages between other Apple devices for free (in most cases, depending on how lenient your network is) in the same manner as RIM's BBM.
It's a simple system, and without the extra confusion of a phone number to worry about it doesn't get in way of actual SMS messages, which was a problem on the iPhone 5. If you're someone who has others in the family set up on an Apple device, you'll find yourself using this feature out and about a fair amount, especially if you've picked up the LTE iPad mini.
FaceTime
One of the 'magical' features for the iPad mini is the ability to call people using FaceTime, which won't come as a shock to many of you, given Apple is certain people need to see their cats before saying goodnight when away on business trips.
The service is much unchanged on this model of iPad, although the HD front-facing camera is an excellent choice for chatting with people using your head rather than just your mouth.
The service was slick (with a strong enough Wi-Fi connection) and although we wish the contacts menu made it clearer who was rocking an Apple device and would thus be ready for FaceTime, the overall experience was smooth and the on-screen power impressive.
Contacts
When it comes to contacts management, Apple has never been the most impressive, and that continues on the iPad mini. While the service is perfectly acceptable in terms of storing names and numbers, the rest of it isn't too intuitive.
For instance, with the involvement of Facebook on iOS 6 you can now see your buddies with phone numbers in your Contacts list, as well as those from iCloud and other services you've connected in, like Exchange.
However, while on other devices (mostly Android) there are clever suggestions to help you link them together, and automatic options in many cases, there's no such thing on the Apple front.
You have to dig into the contact, edit the listing, then tap a tiny '+' icon to call up another list of people to join together. It's not a huge problem, and if you can't be bothered with it you'll just end up with a messy list of associates, but it's irksome when it's so much better implemented on rival platforms.
The app itself isn't the most attractive out there either, simply because in portrait mode Apple hasn't stretched it out to take up the full amount of the screen. It seems curious that the company that prides itself on such elements of design would take this approach, rather focusing on the landscape version of the app, but at least the UI is attractive.
A special mention should be made for the list of letters on the left-hand side, allowing you to skip to the people you want to get hold of easily. This part is really sensitive but also manages to register the letter you're after time and again. It's the little things that please us, and make Apple products so attractive to so many people.
Apple led the way when it came to mobile browsers back in 2007, and five years later the same structure is still giving a decent mobile experiences on a multitude of screen sizes.
The iPad mini Safari browser is an excellent implementation, despite its age; while it lacks some of the impressive bells and whistles of its competitors, the simplicity of being able to scoot between web pages with ease is enough of a trade-off for many.
The browser is fast enough too, although the A5 processor isn't able to match the speed of its bigger new iPad 4 brother over the same Wi-Fi connection, which can render pages a few seconds faster in our tests. It's no slouch, but in the pantheon of top-end devices (including the Google Nexus 7) can all chuck the text and pictures we want to see together in a much more impressive time.
The display resolution isn't too bad for the browsing experience thankfully; with the low-res effort we were worried zoomed-out text would look illegible until we double-tapped or pinched to get closer, but it's good enough for those without eyesight problems to be able to see effectively.
As we mentioned, the iPad mini browser is fairly feature-light, but what it does have is useful. For instance, sharing a web page, printing it out (as long as you have an AirPlay printer connected) and sending the link via mail or Facebook is a simple as tapping the icon, and the integrated nature of the tablet means there's no confusion over what it's doing.
Similarly, we loved the offline reading function - while, again, this isn't a new feature on a mobile device or an Apple product, the portability of the iPad mini puts it in a lovely spot between the iPhone (which can be too small for reading longer articles) and the larger iPad (which can be a hassle to get out on the train compared to the pocket-size of the iPad mini... well, large pockets, that is) for reading the things you don't have time to.
The list is easy to view when trying to find the article you want to read, and the icon to save for offline reading is again easy to hit (in the sharing section).The other feature, and one that's been around for a while is the Reader option, where tagging the feature in the URL bar will give you a cut-down version of the article you're reading without all the unnecessary features that mobile advertising brings.
Again, the iPad mini is the best device for reading the articles you really care about on the go, and beats its budget tablet competition hands down in this area.
Apple should be commended here as well for sticking to its guns in the mobile video arena and eschewing Flash - while its reasoning for not including it previously as a standard in its web browser was suspect, the upshot is we now have a cleaner video format for mobile devices that isn't as convoluted to use.
On the iPad mini, while the video experience isn't as good as it could be thanks to the screen resolution, for web video and clips its excellent, and the speed of loading is more than acceptable. It means sites like the BBC offer nearly all its online content with ease, rather than the frustrating 'Flash is not supported on your device' message we all sadly had to get used to.
There are a few things that irk us when it comes to the web browser on the iPad mini - and not just the slower speeds, which aren't necessary when you consider that the cheaper competition is able to provide a much speedier experience.
Not being able to perform functions like reflowing text to fill the screen as you zoom in are elements we wish Apple would offer, despite knowing that it never will. It would add to the experience immensely, and give a good reason to consider the competition. Of course, you can re-jig the text size in the Reader view, but that's a few steps we don't want to make. We want to see zooming in make the text go bigger automatically.
But overall the iPad mini web experience, while a smidge last-gen, is still one of the best around. It brings ease of use and acceptable speeds while providing an excellent wide screen size to actually see and read the things you want to, either on the sofa or on the go.
When it comes to the iPad mini, it's clear Apple is doing what it has always done and made it into a multimedia hub for the 'modern user on the go'... which in today's terms is the same as every tablet out there.
However, very few can cope with the raw power and breadth of offering available in the iTunes library, which brings a smorgasbord of music, video and books to the device - and that's before you even get into the subject of using third party apps to extend the experience.
Apple has gone where we never thought it would, with the iPad mini bringing the Apple tablet experience to a brave new budget world.The new tablet comes in at a wallet-friendly £279 for the basic version, with 16GB of storage on offer for the Wi-Fi version. You can supplement the mini-slate with up to 64GB of space to chuck movies and music, as well as 4G LTE connectivity, but that will set you back an eye-watering £529 for the top model.
But then again, the iPad mini release isn't about the top end specs with a whopping price tag – it's about beating the likes of the Google Nexus 7and Amazon Kindle Fire HD in the budget stakes.
The two competitors have been getting many column inches so far thanks to the super cheap prices and the impressive specs on board – although with both only offering a 7-inch screen compared to Apple's 7.9-inch offering, the Cupertino board is confident its device will win the day when it comes to capturing consumers' hearts.
However, the more frugal shopper, and especially one buying for a loved one, may not agree with this idea, as the Nexus 7 or Kindle Fire HD costs around 40% less and when faced with a choice between the three might opt for the familiar Amazon brand or the sheer power of the Nexus 7, with its mightily impressive spec list and legions of Google apps.
That said, Apple fans need not worry too much when it comes to whether the iPad mini is a worthy addition to the iBrand, as it comes with enough power and reams of Ive-inspired design to make it a worthwhile addition to the range – this isn't a shrunken down iPad, it's a whole new product again.
Be it the larger screen size, the impressively low weight or the alternative design compared to the competition there's a lot to chew over with the iPad mini – but is it worth spending your hard-earned when more cash will get you a fully-fledged version of Apple's tablet?
The iPad mini is one of those devices that exists because the market started to dictate its presence…but that doesn't mean Apple doesn't want to put its own spin on things.
To that end, the screen is larger at 7.9 inches, the design is completely different to the likes of the new iPad or the Google Nexus 7, and the whole ethos has been created from the ground up partly under the stewardship of Sir Jony Ive, according to Apple.
None of that matters though – what is important is the fact it's a superbly-designed device that at least gives a measure of why it costs so much more than the likes of the Kindle Fire HD.
The aluminium chassis shares the same colouring as the iPhone 5, with the darker black slate and white silver options both bringing a touch of class to proceedings.
At 308g it's twice the weight and then some of the iPhone 5, but compared to other tablets on the market (and combined with the aluminium chassis) it gives a very lightweight feeling the hand.
The screen is something of a worry though – with the 1024 x 768 resolution in the expansive display we're only getting a sharpness akin to the iPhone 3GS. While the display is better than that, thanks to improved IPS LCD technology, its still light years behind the Retina display on the bigger brother new iPad.
If you own a modern iPad, you'll notice the difference straight away. But then again, if you have one of these, then you won't want to buy the iPad mini.
Where the tablet will struggle to impress is when users who own an iPhone are checking it out, as it certainly doesn't have the wow factor of other devices.
In a side by side test of the same movie running on the iPad mini, theNexus 7 and the Kindle Fire HD, the iPad looked the least impressive (although the contrast ratio was certainly more than decent in our eyes).
Then there's the issue of holding the actual tablet. As Apple says, it's as light as pad of legal paper, and there's definitely no notion of this causing undue wrist strain. However, there is an issue with actually holding it, as the iPad mini doesn't really lend itself that well to any manner of grip.
The handsets have been getting criticism for exposing the silver metal below with minimal scratching, and this has begun to happen within a day on the iPad mini – which is all the more confusing seeing as it doesn't live in the pocket with keys and coins.
It's something we hope Apple would have changed in the manufacturing process already, and means you'll need to keep a real eye on how you look after the tablet.
The top and the bottom of the bezel are also wide enough here to rest your hands comfortably, and the likes of landscape web browsing and accelerometer-based gaming are excellent.
The rest of the design is predictably ergonomic when it comes to tapping the minimal level of buttons. The volume rocker keys are close to, but not too near, the mute switch on the top right-hand side.
This is near the power button, which is intuitively placed to always be easy to hit when you want to reactivate the iPad mini… although many will just hit the home button to achieve the same thing.
That traditional Apple home key is predictably here again, and it's shrunken somewhat to fit into the smaller chassis. However, during our testing we found it just as easy as ever to hit, despite the dinkier dimensions.
It's interesting that Apple has popped the headphone jack at the top of the iPad mini, given it's put so much effort in chucking it down at the bottom of the iPhone 5... but we do love it staying above the screen.
The speakers are at the bottom of the iPad mini, flanking the Lightning connector, which offers faster speeds of data transfer and can be connected either way round that you fancy, which is handy when charging before bed and can't be bothered to put the light on.
The speakers provide decent enough sound, but in landscape mode really create a distorted sense of audio, thanks to it firing quite mono-directionally.
The processor being last generation, in the shape of the Apple A5 effort, may worry some but it's likely to be enough for most actions, coupled with 512MB of RAM. It's miles away from the raw grunt of the Google Nexus 7 or the new iPad with its A6X processor, but Apple reckons it helps it hit a sweet spot in terms of price.
When it comes to the interface on the iPad mini, it's not going to be a shock to any long-time Apple users, with the same iOS 6 method of displaying icons still as prevalent as ever.
This means the transition to the smaller size of device will be easy for most, as although the iPad layout, with more space between the icons on the home screen, is prevalent once more, it shrinks down nicely.
Holding the iPad mini in portrait mode is easy enough thanks to the weight, and prodding the icons on screen isn't too difficult nor does it feel like you're going to push the tablet out of your hands and onto the floor, waiting for that heart-stopping moment when you see a crack slide across the display like demon fingers reaching into your wallet.
The iOS interface is simplicity itself, so any users not familiar with Apple's mobile operating system will pick it up in no time at all. The icons are laid out in a 4 by 3 grid, and unlike on the iPhone they will rotate when you move the tablet into landscape format.
The ability to place icons in the bottom dock means you can have the apps you want pervading around the home screen, while dragging and dropping said apps on top of one another will allow you to create folders with ease, which you can rename anything you want.
As we expected with a device running iOS 6 there are no widgets to speak of, which means the only app you can really control from the home screen is the music player, which can be accessed by double tapping the home button (which activates the list of recently-used apps) and swiping left for access to the music controls.
What is also nice here is you can alter the brightness of the iPad mini from the same screen, as well as change the speaker output if you're using AirPlay... little things but the direction Apple needs to take to make iOS a little more modern. It's nothing new, but it works very well on the smaller tablet.
The lock screen is a slightly different matter; for those au fait with iOS on the iPad, this will be old news, but for the newcomers: if you double tap the home button here you'll be presented with access to your music controls again, along with album art displaying when you're listening to music.And there's also the option to have the lock screen as a slide show of all your favourite pictures, which is started up by pressing the photo icon at the bottom - it's these little tweaks that have brought joy to so many Apple users over the years, and we're still impressed by them today.
However, this is still iOS 6 running, and that's becoming something of a problem in our eyes. Not so much at the moment, as there's enough simplicity and function on offer to not make us too worried, but it's a system that is starting to show its age.
For instance, one of our main bugbears is through controlling settings - this is still only really possible through the main 'Settings' app, which means if you want to tweak mail settings, music or apps themselves you'll need to jump out of whatever you're doing and head into another menu from the home screen just to make a small alteration.
However, Apple is still catering for the iPad owners with some handy gestures to make things easier to move around. Instead of double tapping the home button to switch apps, touching the screen with all five fingers and swiping left and right will move you through the most recently-used apps, and pinching all digits together will return you to the home screen.
This is really helpful when using the tablet on the move, as it means you don't need to shuffle the palm around to hit the home button - and it's really cool too. It's an even more intuitive system on the iPad mini than the iPad 'proper', as it somehow fits the screen size better.
We still like the Facebook and Twitter integration – being able to post thoughts directly from the notification centre (available anywhere by dragging from the top of the screen)
Apple might be criticised for bringing last year's technology to the iPad mini, as the A5 chip with 512MB of RAM doesn't sound like a lot when you can buy the quad core Google Nexus 4smartphone with 2GB of RAM for the same price as the mini, and with the same amount of storage too.
However, in practice it's really rather hard to fault Apple's interface performance when using the device in day to day use. It's definitely not got the grunt of the larger new iPad 4, as when we were setting up the device and downloading all manner of music and settings the whole thing melted down and wouldn't let us move around menus or see what was going on with other apps.
But that was a rare situation, as only apps getting snarled up and shutting themselves down caused us any consternation in day to day use. This isn't a regular occurrence, and to be fair happens a lot less on iOS than it does on Android, as Apple's quality control is a tad higher when allowing apps into its marketplace.
And let's not forget about real world use - we tested this side by side with a number of other tablets, including the quad core competition, and when it came to browsing speed we were impressed to see the iPad mini coming up trumps in the speed stakes on a number of occasions. Benchmarks confirm that it can ripple along as well as the competition, and validates Apple's decision to stick with the older processor to keep 'costs down' (or margins up)...
The only real gripe, and it's one you'll hear time and again from us throughout this iPad mini review, is the fact that the screen is too low-res. It simply saddens us to see menus we're used to on both iPads and iPhones not having the same sharpness as before... and we're certainly not used to seeing Apple take a step back in quality.
If you've never used a top end smartphone or tablet, this won't be an issue as the display is fine, and technically still HD in terms of pixel count. But it's definitely the trick Apple is holding up its sleeve for the iPad mini 2 - that Tim Cook is a sneaky one, isn't he?
The way the iPad mini handles messages is two fold: through the impressive email client and now with iMessage on board. When it comes to emailing, there aren't many better clients on the market, with an expansive view and the ability to see your messages differently in both portrait and landscape mode.
You can have multiple accounts set up on the device, be it through Exchange or a web-based service like GMail, and then you're able to see these individually or together in a unified inbox. Either offers an excellent view of your message, with it being easy to delete emails as a batch or as single missives.
But it's the little tweaks that make this option a decent choice for a work-based tablet, if you're one of those types that move around a lot when doing business things.
It's not going to change the world, but there's a lot we like here: the power draw of the email client is relatively minimal compared to older Apple products, you can easily manage folders and see specific emails through the search function and it just makes everything easier than competing products on Android.
And little touches, like being able to swipe right and pull out the inbbox make it a real winner in terms of usability.
The keyboard on the iPad mini was an area we were interested to drill into, as given the smaller proportions of the device we wondered if it was going to be any easier to type on than the larger iPad.
Well, in normal portrait and landscape modes it's a little bit odd. With its bigger brother (and most large screen tablets) you can place them on your lap in landscape mode and rattle out messages at a fairly rapid rate thanks to the bigger display.
That's not possible on the iPad mini really, and holding the device in portrait means you can't type one handed either. However, if you use Apple's clever split dock keyboard, the whole system is much better. This feature is available on the bigger 'Pad, but with the larger size the weight made it hard to hold and type with.
For the iPad mini, typing on the move is an excellent experience once you spend some time practicing - entering text on tablets has always been hard, but this is as easy to use as the impressive SwiftKey on Android, bar the clever auto-prediction of text.
It's obvious Apple would include iMessage on this device, allowing you to send messages between other Apple devices for free (in most cases, depending on how lenient your network is) in the same manner as RIM's BBM.
It's a simple system, and without the extra confusion of a phone number to worry about it doesn't get in way of actual SMS messages, which was a problem on the iPhone 5. If you're someone who has others in the family set up on an Apple device, you'll find yourself using this feature out and about a fair amount, especially if you've picked up the LTE iPad mini.
FaceTime
One of the 'magical' features for the iPad mini is the ability to call people using FaceTime, which won't come as a shock to many of you, given Apple is certain people need to see their cats before saying goodnight when away on business trips.
The service is much unchanged on this model of iPad, although the HD front-facing camera is an excellent choice for chatting with people using your head rather than just your mouth.
The service was slick (with a strong enough Wi-Fi connection) and although we wish the contacts menu made it clearer who was rocking an Apple device and would thus be ready for FaceTime, the overall experience was smooth and the on-screen power impressive.
Contacts
When it comes to contacts management, Apple has never been the most impressive, and that continues on the iPad mini. While the service is perfectly acceptable in terms of storing names and numbers, the rest of it isn't too intuitive.
For instance, with the involvement of Facebook on iOS 6 you can now see your buddies with phone numbers in your Contacts list, as well as those from iCloud and other services you've connected in, like Exchange.
However, while on other devices (mostly Android) there are clever suggestions to help you link them together, and automatic options in many cases, there's no such thing on the Apple front.
You have to dig into the contact, edit the listing, then tap a tiny '+' icon to call up another list of people to join together. It's not a huge problem, and if you can't be bothered with it you'll just end up with a messy list of associates, but it's irksome when it's so much better implemented on rival platforms.
The app itself isn't the most attractive out there either, simply because in portrait mode Apple hasn't stretched it out to take up the full amount of the screen. It seems curious that the company that prides itself on such elements of design would take this approach, rather focusing on the landscape version of the app, but at least the UI is attractive.
A special mention should be made for the list of letters on the left-hand side, allowing you to skip to the people you want to get hold of easily. This part is really sensitive but also manages to register the letter you're after time and again. It's the little things that please us, and make Apple products so attractive to so many people.
Apple led the way when it came to mobile browsers back in 2007, and five years later the same structure is still giving a decent mobile experiences on a multitude of screen sizes.
The iPad mini Safari browser is an excellent implementation, despite its age; while it lacks some of the impressive bells and whistles of its competitors, the simplicity of being able to scoot between web pages with ease is enough of a trade-off for many.
The browser is fast enough too, although the A5 processor isn't able to match the speed of its bigger new iPad 4 brother over the same Wi-Fi connection, which can render pages a few seconds faster in our tests. It's no slouch, but in the pantheon of top-end devices (including the Google Nexus 7) can all chuck the text and pictures we want to see together in a much more impressive time.
The display resolution isn't too bad for the browsing experience thankfully; with the low-res effort we were worried zoomed-out text would look illegible until we double-tapped or pinched to get closer, but it's good enough for those without eyesight problems to be able to see effectively.
As we mentioned, the iPad mini browser is fairly feature-light, but what it does have is useful. For instance, sharing a web page, printing it out (as long as you have an AirPlay printer connected) and sending the link via mail or Facebook is a simple as tapping the icon, and the integrated nature of the tablet means there's no confusion over what it's doing.
Similarly, we loved the offline reading function - while, again, this isn't a new feature on a mobile device or an Apple product, the portability of the iPad mini puts it in a lovely spot between the iPhone (which can be too small for reading longer articles) and the larger iPad (which can be a hassle to get out on the train compared to the pocket-size of the iPad mini... well, large pockets, that is) for reading the things you don't have time to.
The list is easy to view when trying to find the article you want to read, and the icon to save for offline reading is again easy to hit (in the sharing section).The other feature, and one that's been around for a while is the Reader option, where tagging the feature in the URL bar will give you a cut-down version of the article you're reading without all the unnecessary features that mobile advertising brings.
Again, the iPad mini is the best device for reading the articles you really care about on the go, and beats its budget tablet competition hands down in this area.
Apple should be commended here as well for sticking to its guns in the mobile video arena and eschewing Flash - while its reasoning for not including it previously as a standard in its web browser was suspect, the upshot is we now have a cleaner video format for mobile devices that isn't as convoluted to use.
On the iPad mini, while the video experience isn't as good as it could be thanks to the screen resolution, for web video and clips its excellent, and the speed of loading is more than acceptable. It means sites like the BBC offer nearly all its online content with ease, rather than the frustrating 'Flash is not supported on your device' message we all sadly had to get used to.
There are a few things that irk us when it comes to the web browser on the iPad mini - and not just the slower speeds, which aren't necessary when you consider that the cheaper competition is able to provide a much speedier experience.
Not being able to perform functions like reflowing text to fill the screen as you zoom in are elements we wish Apple would offer, despite knowing that it never will. It would add to the experience immensely, and give a good reason to consider the competition. Of course, you can re-jig the text size in the Reader view, but that's a few steps we don't want to make. We want to see zooming in make the text go bigger automatically.
But overall the iPad mini web experience, while a smidge last-gen, is still one of the best around. It brings ease of use and acceptable speeds while providing an excellent wide screen size to actually see and read the things you want to, either on the sofa or on the go.
When it comes to the iPad mini, it's clear Apple is doing what it has always done and made it into a multimedia hub for the 'modern user on the go'... which in today's terms is the same as every tablet out there.
However, very few can cope with the raw power and breadth of offering available in the iTunes library, which brings a smorgasbord of music, video and books to the device - and that's before you even get into the subject of using third party apps to extend the experience.
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